Locked Out!

Don’t you hate it when you lock your keys in your car?! So annoying! You stand outside your vehicle, staring at the keys that would be within reach if not for that irritating glass window in the way! Grrrrrr! I know you all can relate, don’t act like it’s never happened to you. I’ve done it, more times than I would like to admit, and it never gets any less irritating. Yet somehow, it’s just a little more amusing when you are not the one responsible for the incident. Sorry, Eddie!

Yesterday evening, at around 6:30pm, I was sitting comfortably at home with my puppy when I received a phone call from Eddie. “Um, I locked myself out of the car,” he said with a chuckle. I laughed, he had to be joking! Right?! No, no he wasn’t. He actually locked himself out of his car when he stopped to make a deposit at the bank. So, it was “Jean to the Rescue!!” Or so I thought.

Eddie told me where to find the 2 spare keys to our cars and, not knowing which one was which, I grabbed both and headed out to meet him. He wasn’t that far away from home, it wouldn’t take long to get there and get back. Easy! I am SO glad we have those spare keys! Oh, but no…it didn’t turn out to be that easy. Neither of the 2 keys I found were a key to his car. So, it was on to Plan B.

Eddie had noticed A BMW service shop right across the way from where he was stranded. So, I stayed in my car, watching out for Eddie’s car which was parked “in the Red”, while he ran over to see if there was anyone there who could help us out. Of course, the first guy he spoke to was really nice and willing to help out, but he had to ask someone else to get the tools. Well, this second guy was “willing to help” too, for only $150. What?! Unable, and unwilling, to pay that amount of money to get into our car, Eddie kindly declined his offer and walked away. And that’s how we get to Plan C.

I headed back home with the instructions to look in a different drawer for the spare key and bring it back or, if I still couldn’t find it, to come back with a hanger and the tool box. The key was STILL nowhere to be found, so off I went, again, this time with tools in hand.

Eddie in action

To make this long story short, let’s fast forward about an hour. Eddie’s phone had already died after watching YouTube videos about “how to break into your car”, the sun was long gone and it was getting darker, we were both freezing and shivering because of the cold night breeze, and we were not any closer to getting into our car. A friend (who shall remain nameless for their own protection) had offered early on in this adventure to call their “auto club” service (which shall also remain nameless) to help get us out of this mess. Only now willing to admit defeat, Eddie finally agreed we should take him up on this generous offer. It only took said “service” about 10 minutes to arrive and less than a minute to open our car door. The guy didn’t even ask to see our “membership card”, so our friend who was on his way to meet us with the card was able to stay home instead.

So, with a little help from our friends and a $5 tip to the driver (because this was all the cash we had on hand at the moment), we were finally able to get done what could have been done hours before! Oy vey!

Total savings on this adventure: $145

Total cost: $5 and 2 hours of my life that I can’t get back.

Was it worth it? Hell yes!

As we both climbed into our separate cars to finally head home, we quickly realized the adventure was not quite over. Now, my car wouldn’t start!! The battery had died after leaving the hazard lights on the whole time. *sigh* Lucky for us, it wasn’t anything a quick jumpstart couldn’t fix!

6 comments

Been there and done it all. Sorry. Not fun. The one laugh we get years later about this is that Greg was 3 and Jeff 18 months when I locked mine. In my panic, all Greg thought about doing was turning around in the back seat, sitting down and opening up his lunchbox and eating his lunch at 8 in the morning.